


White Knuckles

by tsthrace



Series: Songs sent, ficlets written [3]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Academia, Alternate Universe - Academia, Angst, Enemies to Lovers, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 08:29:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21353245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsthrace/pseuds/tsthrace
Summary: Prof. Woods gives Prof. Griffin a look over a martini at a sci fi lit conference in Bloomington. Later, in the hotel room, Prof. Griffin gets vulnerable about God andA Wrinkle in Time. They click. Things are going very right—until Prof. Woods is forced into a terrible choice and leaves them utterly and bitterly dependent on one another.Or: Geeky badass academics meet, fall, betray, and come back together. It's a mess.
Relationships: Clarke Griffin/Lexa
Series: Songs sent, ficlets written [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1506911
Comments: 47
Kudos: 173





	White Knuckles

**Author's Note:**

  * For [posdata](https://archiveofourown.org/users/posdata/gifts).

> This one-shot is based on [White Knuckles](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X03fLkFHzVM) by Tegan and Sara, as requested by [@damiana-atx](https://damiana-atx.tumblr.com).
> 
> There's a bit of swearing.

“Fuck, this is good,” Clarke said aloud to no one as she tossed the journal on the table. She leaned back in her chair. _ Godlessness Centered: Negotiating Queerness in The Left Hand of Darkness _ by Alexandria J. Woods, PhD. When Clarke had first picked up the journal, she scoffed. _ The Left Hand of Darkness?_ _Really? And queerness? How overdone. _

But it was brilliant. A discourse on Le Guin’s own spirituality and how it defied casual dualities. 

_ I should have thought of that. _

She looked at her watch. Twenty minutes. 

* * *

Lexa smoothed the lapels on her blazer, though they were already perfectly flat. She gazed at herself in the hotel mirror, staring at the buttons on her shirt. She had a choice to make—the choice of the one awkward button. Button it, and she would seem, well, buttoned-up, uptight. But unbuttoned, it was a bit...revealing. There was no middle ground. 

She pushed her glasses up on her nose and took a breath. Then buttoned the button.

* * *

They met in Bloomington, Indiana. All the sci fi literature conferences seemed to be in random small cities in the Midwest. They were strange events. Mostly men in khaki and tweed carrying beat-up leather satchels, experts on Vonnegut and Wells (H.G., that is). But there was also the overt geek element. Undergrad boys carrying frayed copies of Asimov and Gaiman, their laptops covered in Star Trek and My Little Pony stickers, and the occasional girl wearing a Strong Female Character t-shirt. 

Then there was Lexa, sharp in a plain black cashmere sweater and grey herringbone slacks, her glasses suggesting both intelligence and the ability to break you. The geeks followed her but kept an admiring distance. 

Clarke, for some reason, seemed more approachable. As she sipped her gin and tonic at the hotel bar, the kids (as she called college students) would creep up to her, their eyes down. 

“Dr. Griffin?” they’d ask.

“Call me Clarke,” she’d say, smiling.

“I just had some questions on your takedown of the _ Darkover _ series.”

Clarke would always give them about twenty minutes then politely end the conversation, turning back to her drink.

She had had three such conversations when she felt a tap on her shoulder. Clarke didn’t mind the attention, but she was getting tired. She spun around, ready to dismiss herself.

“Dr. Griffin.” Lexa stood above her.

“Dr. Woods,” Clarke replied, nodding politely. She had read all of Lexa’s work. She had to. They were two of the only feminist sci fi lit scholars who were regularly publishing. But they’d never actually met. 

“I don’t really prefer the term ‘doctor.’” Lexa said, looking just past Clarke. “It’s a little....” She didn’t finish her thought. After a moment she tilted her head. “Do you really think we should stop reading Bradley because of her scandal?”

Clarke put her drink down. “Scandal is kind of an understatement. And I didn’t say we should stop. I just said it’s hard.”

Without invitation, Lexa sat down at Clarke’s table. “If we bring every artist’s personal life into how we engage with their work, we probably won’t be able to enjoy anything.”

Clarke raised an eyebrow. “I never took you for a modernist.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“That sometimes shitty people create amazing art.” Lexa’s eyes lit up with her smile, like she was issuing a friendly challenge.

“Are you flirting with me?” Clarke returned her version of the same smile.

Lexa sat back and shrugged. She took a sip of her martini. 

* * *

A few hours later, Clarke was sprawled across Lexa’s bed looking up, her hair in tangles across the pillow, a corner of the sheet pulled over her midsection. Lexa was curled up next to her, sweaty and wondering what just happened. She took a few breaths, looking for words. She squinted to herself, couldn’t think of anything to say. She felt Clarke shuffle a bit and prepared for the awkward banter that would come when they’d get up to look for their clothes. 

“Do you believe in God?” Clarke asked instead. She didn’t get up.

“Pardon?”

“Do you believe in God?” Her tone was so casual.

“I...I don’t know.” Lexa looked up at the ceiling. She suddenly felt cold and reached down for a blanket. “Why do you ask?”

“I think I do,” Clarke said, not answering the question. 

“Why?”

“I just look around this world, and it seems pretty incredible to me. Like it wasn’t an accident. Someone had to have created all this. Created us. Then made us creators.” Clarke shook her head and looked past Lexa. “It all seems like such a miracle.”

“Are you a Christian?” Lexa felt her face crumple.

Clarke laughed. “I don’t know. I do like the idea of the trinity.” 

“When I grew up, my parents took me to one of those born again churches.” Lexa looked down. “It was mostly Jesus. I mean, I know what the trinity is, but…” Why was she telling her this? 

“No, that’s not what I mean.” Clarke shook her head. “Not like God as some guy who makes you love him or else you burn in hell. That’s bullshit.”

Lexa squinted. 

“The trinity. It’s like a dance between these three ways God reveals herself.” Clarke smiled. “It’s beautiful actually.” She looked at Lexa. “Did you ever read _ A Wrinkle in Time _?”

Lexa side-eyed her. “Clarke, I’m a sci fi scholar.”

“Okay, so there’s Mrs. Who, Mrs. Whatsit, and Mrs. Which…”

They stayed up the rest of the night, moving from L’Engle to Shelley to Jemisin and the spiritual worlds of their stories. Evil and suffering, goodness and hope. Retribution, sacrifice, and justice. Beauty and joy. Mouth to neck, hands to curves, skin to skin.

By dawn, Lexa had found God.

* * *

Lexa went back to UC Irvine and Clarke returned to her adjunct job at Georgetown, but they emailed constantly. Long, meandering messages about particular chapters of _ The Stone Sky _ and _ Spinning Silver_. Clarke sent her Marilynne Robinson essays, and Lexa responded with questions. Together, they laid theologies over imagined worlds, mapped them out and connected them to other imagined worlds. They took down _ Ender’s Game_, built up _ The Hainish Cycle_, and even let themselves dabble in _ Stardust_, which they both had to admit they secretly admired. Back and forth, tens of thousands of words over the course of months. They only talked on the phone a few times, but the emails were constant.

Not long into their messages, Clarke had mentioned how her father had died when she was young. Lexa hinted at being on her own at age 16. These details were wrapped in blankets of analysis and metaphor, the theological undercurrents of the imagined worlds they studied, the anthropology of beings who only existed on pages and in minds.

They made plans to meet in Cleveland to present together at a lit crit conference. A week before, Lexa bailed. “Sorry,” the text said. “An emergency came up.”

“Everything okay?” Clarke responded.

Nothing. 

The conference was rough. Clarke knew it would be, but she thought she’d have Lexa’s powerful presence demanding attention. The lit crit crowd all secretly loved what they called “genre” fiction—sci fi and fantasy—but they publicly derided it as “unserious” or “not literary.” She held her own, but it wasn’t fun.

She texted Lexa when she got back to her hotel room. “Wish you had been here. Same straight white male bullshit as usual.” 

Silence. 

“Did I say something wrong?” Clarke texted a few days later. At that point, though, she knew Lexa was gone.

A heaviness set in on her. Clarke reread their messages looking for hints, but Lexa’s words seemed wide open, even joyful. _ What happened? _

She immersed herself in a chapter she was writing for a textbook on book fandoms and lecturing on feminism and postmodernism in _ Harry Potter _ —not her favorite topic, but it was a popular course. She had almost let herself forget about Lexa when, six months later, she was flipping through _ Foundation: The Journal of Science Fiction _ and saw her byline in the table of contents. _ Justice & Joy: The God Revealed in the Feminist Imagination_. By Alexandria J. Woods, PhD. 

Clarke turned to page 137 and ran her eyes down the columns. She bit her lip. The essay was essentially a catalog of their emails, one idea bridged skillfully to another by Lexa’s pointed and lucid prose. But they weren’t just Lexa’s ideas. They weren’t just Clarke’s, either, but a stream of their thoughts flowing together like a river. It was beautifully done. 

Clarke didn’t notice that her hands were balled into fists until she felt her nails cutting into the skin. She opened her laptop and pulled up the messages. Lexa had been careful to rephrase Clarke’s words, but it was all there, even with citations of Marilynne Robinson. _ The Death of Adam_.

Clarke pounded out an email. _ How dare you...couldn’t even ask for me to be a coauthor...you hadn’t even thought about these things until you met me_. She knew Lexa wouldn’t see it. She probably had blocked her address. She didn’t bother hitting send. 

Her face fell into her hands. She remembered that night in Bloomington. Lexa’s smile—that curiosity despite herself. The way her hands traced the skin over Clarke’s side. 

_ That woman wouldn’t have done this. _But there it was. Twenty-six pages of shared conversation now claimed for Lexa only.

* * *

Clarke’s department was buzzing about it the next day. The religious studies chair was also a huge geek who kept up with _ Foundation_, and he had been blown away by how seamlessly interdisciplinary the article was. “I hadn’t thought to connect the Christian trinity and _ A Wrinkle in Time_, but it’s really so obvious when you think about it.”

Clarke seethed. She thought about printing up the emails, sending them to _ Foundation _ and the UC Irvine Disciplinary Committee, but something stopped her. Allegations of plagiarism would ruin Lexa’s career as a scholar. And was it really plagiarism? Clarke wanted to be sure, but she wasn’t.

So she wrote instead. A deep and cutting rebuttal highlighting where Alexandria J. Woods’ religious arguments were rudimentary at best, illustrating how shallow her connections were, and then plunging further, mining Catherine Keller and other theologians for an even deeper exploration of the worlds of Butler and Clarke (Arthur C., that is). _ Foundation _ published her essay the next quarter. Lexa answered, bringing in Buddhism and Humanism. A spotlight grew around their debate, so they continued writing—back and forth between literary, cultural, and religious journals. WIRED magazine picked up the story: _ Feuding Feminists Shifting the Sci Fi Landscape_.

That’s when the invites started rolling in. A conference on spirituality and pop culture invited them to speak on a panel together, but Clarke refused. She couldn’t bear to see Lexa in person. Instead, she accepted an invitation to lecture at NYU while Lexa spoke at Cal. 

Clarke’s classes filled with long waitlists every semester, her success intertwined with Lexa’s and their endless intellectual feud. They both thrived. Lexa’s ideas sharpened Clarke’s, and Clarke’s sharpened Lexa’s. She couldn’t admit it, but she needed Lexa as much as she despised her. 

* * *

Lexa was in her office when the call came. 

“Dr. Woods?” A male voice.

“It’s Professor Woods.” 

“Excuse me, Professor Woods,” he corrected himself. “This is Dr. William Porter at Georgetown. The chair of the Department of English.”

Lexa felt something jump in her chest. “Good morning.”

“I’m calling because a very generous donor has recently endowed a tenure-track professorship here specifically for women in science fiction studies.”

“You’re kidding me.” it felt like a prank, and a mean one at that. Lexa had never heard of such a thing. 

“Uh, no.” Dr. Porter seemed thrown off. “We’re inviting only a few people to apply, and you’re on our short list. Is this something you’d be interested in?”

They hung up with lingering plans to arrange flights and meetings. 

Lexa sat for a few minutes, her fingers tapping idly on her closed laptop. Clarke would be one of the other candidates—and maybe the only other candidate—she was sure. She looked down and shook her head, thinking back to that day when she made the worst decision of her life.

She had printed out some of the emails she had sent Clarke to reference them against some short stories when the dean knocked on her door. He noticed a copy of L’Engle’s _ Walking on Water _ open on her desk. 

“What’s that about?” he asked.

“Uh, just a side project I’m working on.” Her face burned with the exposure of her new interest in religious studies.

“Mind if I look?” he asked, picking up one of the print-outs before she could answer.

She bit her lip as he read, his forehead creasing. 

After a few minutes, he looked up. “Professor Woods, this is good stuff.” 

She took a deep breath and let it out. “Thank you. I’ve been working with Professor Griffin at Georgetown—”

“But these are your words, right?”

“Yeah, what you’re holding. That’s mine.” 

“You need to publish this. It could be really good for you and the department.”

“Yeah, Professor Griffin and I—”

“Lexa,” he said in that kind but firm I’m-A-Man-In-Charge voice, “there’s a distinction to be made between attribution and inspiration. I’m inspired every day by the ocean, by James Joyce.” Lexa hid her contempt. Scholars who pretended to understand Joyce were pretentious liars. “But I’m not citing them.”

“Dr. Titus.” Her voice was firm. “I couldn’t have written that without Professor Griffin.”

“Professor Woods.” He looked her straight in the eye. “This department doesn’t need a co-authored paper with someone from Georgetown. We need a win.” He tapped the paper. “These are your words. Are they the product of a broader conversation? Sure, but what isn’t?” He looked out the window at the budding trees. “We took a chance on your genre work. And I’m seeing some good stuff. But I need to see more if we’re going to keep you on.”

Lexa looked past Dr. Titus and took in a silent breath. Jobs in her specialty was rare. UC Irvine had invested more than most schools to create a department where someone like her could thrive. She nodded. 

“Get me an abstract and outline next week,” the dean said. “The managing editor at _ Foundation _ is a former student.”

When he left, she took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. She would need to cancel her panel with Clarke in Cleveland. She wasn’t sure if she’d ever be able to look at her again.

* * *

Clarke let out a deep breath as she stepped into the crisp fall air. It had been a long day of interviews. She stopped on the stairs. She knew Lexa was close by. She had to be. They were the two people in the country most qualified for the job. She’d been on these interview panels before. Two, sometimes three, a day, candidates rotating between deans and panels. Clarke was surprised she hadn’t seen her yet. 

She shook her head. Maybe she should have said something about that first paper. The job would be hers if she had. But would she even be considered without that paper? It had launched her career. Her public debate with Alexandria J. Woods, PhD, got her lectures around the country, a longform article in _ The Atlantic, _and the keynote spot at conferences that two years ago would have never taken her seriously. Their refusal to appear together added to their mystique. Geeks and academics alike lined up on reddit and twitter to take sides. 

Her success was bound to Lexa’s, two sides of the same double helix. 

She bundled a scarf around her neck. It didn’t matter where Lexa was. Clarke loved the work she did, and she had rocked the interviews. But she was tired. It was time for a drink. She pulled out her phone to call a Lyft. Something about the fading purple sky changed her mind, though, and she decided to walk. 

The cobblestones on O Street felt somehow comforting under her feet. Solid. Old. Not going anywhere. She thought about calling Dr. Reyes from the engineering department to join her—Raven was always good for either a loud night of much alcohol or a quiet night of raw, stinging truth—the latter of which was why Clarke had never told her all that had happened with Lexa. She shook her head. Maybe she just needed some gin and silence.

She sat at the bar at L’Annexe and ordered a Tom Collins. Bartenders always smiled curiously at her when she ordered one. _ Funny, you don’t look like a 75 year-old man to me. _ She’d smile back impatiently. _ Just make my damn drink. _ When the drink arrived, she took a sip and let out a deep breath as the gin started to glow through her. No one can fuck up a Tom Collins. It was simple and always felt good and sharp and bright going down. 

She was halfway through her drink when a man sat next to her and ordered a scotch. Clarke glanced at his plaid scarf, wool sweater, and worn leather shoulder bag. Definitely a TA. He noticed her looking at him and smiled. 

“I’ve seen you,” he said. “You teach that Harry Potter course.”

Clarke’s stifled a sigh. “That’s me.” She tilted her head back and drank the rest of her Tom Collins in one swig.

“Can I get you another?”

“No,” she said, picking up her bag. She made eye contact with the bartender. “I need to pay.”

“Whoa,” the man in the scarf said, raising his hands. “I’m just trying to be nice.”

“And I was just trying to be alone.” Clarke nodded towards the guy sitting on the other side of him. “Maybe you can be nice to him.” She dropped some cash on the check that had arrived and made her way to the door.

It was darker outside than when she’d arrived. And colder. She buttoned her wool coat and started making her way down Pennsylvania Ave. towards the bus stop. 

* * *

Lexa was sipping a Syrah at a window table when she saw Clarke walk by outside. She took in a breath, remembering how Clarke’s eyes got soft when she asked, “Do you believe in God?” She shook her head. She could just let her keep going, and they could go on avoiding each other forever. Unless Lexa got the job.

_ Shit. _

She grabbed her coat, leaving a $20 under her mostly full glass. By the time Lexa got out the door, Clarke was halfway down the block, almost lost in a crowd of loud students. Lexa didn’t button her coat, and it billowed out as she jogged down the street.

“Clarke!” she shouted as she got closer. She saw Clarke stop, her back straighten and stiffen. She didn’t turn around.

* * *

Clarke wanted to be angry. When she heard that voice, she wanted to spin on her heel and unleash a cascade of expletives that would make the passersby uncomfortable. She not only wanted Lexa to hear the words _ traitor, cheat, betrayed_, she wanted her to feel the force of them rip through her body like a landmine.

But she froze. When she heard that voice, she felt tears sting at the corner of her eyes. She felt a slow storm in her chest, all rain and no lightning. She closed her eyes. She wanted to be angry, but all she felt was heaviness. She held her breath and waited.

When she opened her eyes, Lexa was in front of her, her eyes uncertain and her arms folded in front of her. “Hey…” she said after a few moments.

Clarke bit into her lip, hoping not to draw blood. She looked up, her blue eyes blazing, about to spark. She could tell Lexa was waiting for her to say something, so she stayed silent.

Lexa nodded. “I’m so sorry, Clarke.” She didn’t know what else to say.

Clarke’s eyes locked on Lexa’s, but she refused to respond.

“I don’t expect you to understand...” Lexa trailed off. “It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.” She looked past Clarke to a stoplight turning from yellow to red.

Lexa’s open coat revealed a gray plaid suit, smart and uncompromising, the top button studiously and chastely buttoned. So she had interviewed today. In this moment, though, it all felt wrong. Lexa seemed so small to Clarke. She wasn’t the woman she met at the hotel that night, but she also wasn’t the woman who submitted that article. This woman was drawn in on herself, her hair falling around her face like a curtain. Clarke remained silent.

Lexa sucked in her lips. “I know you probably hate me, and I get it.” She looked down. “I hate me, too.”

“No.” Clarke’s voice was deep and quiet. “You don’t get to do that.” She felt confused when she saw a shadow of relief cross Lexa’s face.

“You’re right,” Lexa said. “That’s not fair.” She took a long, deep breath and let it out. “I’m going to tell them.” She looked Clarke in the eye. “I’m going to tell Georgetown, and I’m going to tell _ Foundation_. I’ll—”

“Don’t.” Clarke cut her off. “It’s done.”

“But—”

“Fuck you, Lexa.” She barely looked at her as pushed past, a slow fire burning through her as she walked briskly towards Dupont Square.

* * *

Lexa was freezing by the time she got back to her hotel room. She had stood on the sidewalk for a long time, watching Clarke get smaller and smaller. She didn’t know what she’d been expecting. Forgiveness? Punishment? Clarke had given her neither, which is what she knew she deserved. 

She had never written a paper more carefully, never thought about the ideas so closely, never danced so delicately around sentence structure and tense. In a twisted way, she was proud of it. It was sophisticated but accessible, and completely defensible. Even if Clarke had tried to accuse her, she was sure she would have won. 

She shook her head sharply. _ That’s not who I am. _ But it was. She was intelligent and ambitious and ready for a breakthrough. She knew Titus had been threatening her, but she also knew that what she had been writing with Clarke was good. Really good. She had never felt so alive in her work as when she was in conversation with Clarke. No one had ever challenged or inspired her like that. Even after that first paper, her debates with Clarke from essay to essay were electric, almost feverish. Clarke tapped something in her that was insatiable. 

She picked up her laptop and opened some of the first emails she and Clarke had exchanged after Bloomington. She couldn’t help but smile. There had been a giddiness to them, this breathless excitement to constantly share new discoveries, interesting connections. They had sent seven, sometimes eight, messages a day. Thousands of words. 

And that night in Bloomington.

She closed the laptop. _ Was it worth it? _ For months, Lexa had tried to convince herself that it had just been one night, that she didn’t even really know Clarke. When she saw Clarke on that sidewalk tonight, though, she knew that was all bullshit. 

They had been falling for each other the best way they knew how. Lexa had betrayed all of it.

* * *

Lexa was sitting on the floor outside Clarke’s office when she arrived the next morning. 

Clarke sighed. “Seriously?” She didn’t look at her as she slid her key in the lock. “What are you doing here?”

“I had a meeting to cancel.” Lexa shrugged, not getting up.

Clarke pushed her door open. “I don’t have anything else to say to you, Dr. Woods.”

“I withdrew my name.”

Clarke froze. “Why?” Clarke noticed jeans and a sweater under Lexa’s coat. Her hair was pulled back in a messy bun. She was serious. 

“You know why.”

Clarke’s eyes narrowed. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yes, I did,” Lexa said steadily as she stood up. The smallness from the night before was gone. She stood tall, her shoulders thrown back. “I don’t know who else they’re interviewing, but I’m not your competition anymore.” She swallowed and looked into Clarke’s eyes. “I don’t want to be your competition anymore.”

Clarke let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. She wanted to say, _ Good luck, Dr. Woods _, and close the door behind her, but instead she felt herself pushing the door open, heard herself saying, “Come in.”

Lexa bit her lip. “You sure?”

Clarke nodded and ushered her in. The door clicked as it closed behind them. Clarke set her bag down and sat at her desk. She shook her head, frustrated. “I just want to hate you. That’s all. I want to tell you to fuck off, and I want to go on with my life.”

Lexa sat in the reading chair in the corner of Clarke’s office. She nodded, looking down at her hands. “Then why don’t you?”

Clarke huffed, a cynical laugh. “I can’t get away. You’re everywhere.” She threw up her hands. “I saw you on the fucking New Yorker site this morning. How did you land that?” A rhetorical question. “I assign your essays for my classes. I have to. I hate how good you are.”

“You’re good, too, Clarke,” Lexa said quietly. She looked up. “Very good. I keep researching and writing because you keep responding.”

Clarke closed her eyes. She knew it was the same for her, but she didn’t want to say it. Finally she looked up. “Why did you do it?”

Lexa looked past her at Clarke’s diplomas on the wall. Undergrad at Cornell. She shook her head, almost said _ I don’t know_, but she didn’t want to lie. “I wanted to do something big.” She gathered the courage to look at Clarke’s face. “I wanted to do it with you, but my dean pressured me to take solo authorship.” She closed her eyes, ashamed. “And I was a coward.”

“Yeah.” Clarke leaned back in her chair. “You were.”

Everything that came into Lexa’s head to say felt like an excuse, so she kept her mouth shut. They both did, the loud ticking of the cheap clock on the wall cutting through the silence.

Finally Clarke shook her head. A corner of her mouth curved up. “It was really beautifully done.”

Lexa looked up, her head tilted.

“I was so fucking angry, Lexa.” Clarke breathed out like she was letting something go. “I should have been a coauthor, but, fuck, it was well written. Like it was on a whole other level.”

Lexa’s green eyes were bright as they locked in on Clarke’s. “You inspire me, Dr. Griffin.” She sat back. “It’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” She paused and sucked in her lips. “I think we should write a book together.”

As soon as Clarke heard the words, she knew it was a good idea. Maybe the best idea. But all that would come out was, “Fuck you, Lexa.” It was almost a laugh. 

Lexa’s face was stone, but her eyes were alive. “An editor already approached me. If I brought you on…”

“You can’t buy your way out of the shitty thing you did, Lexa.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Lexa ran her hand over her hair then looked up, her face suddenly soft. “I meant it, Clarke. I’m better with you.” She shrugged. “And I think you’re better with me, too.”

Clarke bit her lip. She took in a heavy breath, and let it out in a long sigh. She stood up. “Come here.”

Lexa squinted her eyes.

“Just come here, please. You owe me that.”

Lexa stood up in front of Clarke. Clarke lifted her hand to her face and leaned in, her lips barely touching Lexa’s. Lexa didn’t move, but Clarke felt her shiver. She leaned in and kissed her softly. Then she pulled back.

“I just…” Clarke didn’t know where the end of that sentence was supposed to go, and she didn’t tried to find it. Instead, she lifted her eyes and looked at Lexa as her chest rose and fell, rose and fell. 

Lexa held her breath.

Finally Clarke smiled, almost laughing at herself. “That’s not a yes, Dr. Woods. But it’s not a no.”

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was a bit of an experiment for me—different than anything else I've written here. Let me know what you think!
> 
> If you enjoyed this, drop me a kudo!  
If you have feelings, drop me a comment!  
I'm also always open to respectful concrit.
> 
> If you have a song you'd like me to base a little one shot like this on, send it my way! I promise you at least 1,000 words.  
Find me on [tumblr](https://tsthrace.tumblr.com/) or email me at tsthrace at gmail.


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